No Bonnet Carré Spillway opening anticipated this year, U.S. Army Corps says
The Bonnet Carré Spillway is not expected to open this year, the U.S. Army Corps commander in New Orleans said in a meeting covered by Louisiana media Wednesday in Baton Rouge.
Water levels are expected to be lower than they were in 2019, when the spillway opened for a record-setting 123 days and created a federal fisheries disaster for coastal Mississippi, Louisiana and Alabama.
Col. Stephen Murphy, commander and district engineer for the Corps’ New Orleans District, said at the Louisiana Coastal Restoration and Protection Authority meeting that the river is expected to crest in early March, New Orleans City Business said.
Murphy also said he does not anticipate opening of the Morganza Floodway above Baton Rouge, City Business reported. The Morganza has been opened only two times in history, most recently during record flooding in 2011, when the Bonnet Carre also opened.
Joe Spraggins, director of the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources, said he expects to meet Monday with Murphy, plus the Vicksburg district commander and Maj. Gen. Mark Toy. Toy, head of the Corps’ Mississippi Valley Division, ultimately makes the call on the spillway opening in consultation with Murphy.
Spraggins said rainfall over the next two weeks to 30 days will ultimately determine whether the spillway opens.
“I learned long ago in the military to never try to forecast the weather,” he said.
For the first time, he said, the Corps is planning a stakeholders meeting not only in Louisiana but also in Mississippi ahead of any proposed opening of the Bonnet Carré.
Spraggins said Army Corps officials have heard South Mississippi’s outcries over the repeated openings of the Bonnet Carré in recent years and the devastation it has created for seafood, tourism and related industries.
The fresh water not only kills oyster beds and other aquatic life, it also allowed blue-green algae to flourish across the Mississippi Coast this past tourist season, closing the Mississippi Sound to swimmers and beachgoers.
Both the state of Mississippi and Coast localities are pressing lawsuits against the Corps over the Bonnet Carré.
